He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not
by TouchofPixieDust
Summary: Inuyasha watches as Kagome shows Shippo how to play the flower petal fortune telling game, He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not. It has the hanyou asking himself all sorts of questions.


Disclaimer: The characters of Inuyasha are owned by Rumiko Takahashi, but this story belongs to me.

He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not

"He loves me."

Inuyasha skidded to a stop. Chasing Shippo down to clobber him for setting the last container of ramen on fire no longer seemed all that important. Before the miko could spot him, he leapt into the tree behind her and crept along the branches until he was right above her. It wasn't that he cared who loved her or anything. And it wasn't the soft sigh-ing way she said it that made him stop either. He just happened to suddenly be very tired and needed a break.

Hey, even tough hanyous need a break every once in awhile. No need for anyone to make a fuss about it should anyone catch him. Er… see him.

"He loves me not."

Whew. He wasn't holding his breath. It was just a really long pause before the exhale. It's an important breathing technique. Breath control is essential in battle. Why does she sound so sad that he doesn't love her? Who is HE?

"He loves me."

Okay, she really has to make up her mind. Does he or doesn't he? And who in the name of all that is holy is he? Does she have to sound so hopeful when she says that? Not that Inuyasha really cared, mind you. Well, okay, maybe he cared a little. But that was only because she was his shard detector and his best friend. So it was perfectly natural to care a little bit. A smidgen really.

"He loves me not."

There was no reason for there to be that sad little catch in her voice when she says the word 'not'. Seriously. Inuyasha studied her. It seemed that she was so distressed over whether or not this jerk loved her that she was ripping apart a flower. Though he agreed that ripping things apart was a good stress reliever, he didn't think she was doing a very good job at the ripping part. It was more like gentle plucking. What does plucking relieve? NOTHING! He'd really have to give her some pointers. Though he'd have to find a way to compensate for her puny practically worthless fingernails.

"He loves me."

Hmmm… odd. This time she even sounds sad when she said that he loved her. Two seconds ago she was all warm and fuzzy that he loved her. Now she's sad? What is it with women and their mood swings? The dog demon didn't think he would ever understand human females. Or was it females in general? And why was this jerk messing with Kagome's emotions anyhow? Can't he make up his mind?

"He loves me not."

He watched as she tossed the petal free flower into a small pile of other naked stems. It looked as if she had been dismembering flowers most of the morning. The stress relieving obviously didn't go so well since she looked so depressed.

"Hey Kagome!"

She sat up and put a smile on her face, though Inuyasha could tell it was a bit of a struggle. Whoever this guy was, he wasn't worth what she was putting herself through. It would be best if she just ditched him, then she wouldn't have to be so mopey. The guy is the very last thing on the list of important things. In fact, he doesn't even really make the list at all, he's more of a side note. He is so UN-important that it was unlikely that anyone would miss him should he happen to meet with a tragic end. Accidentally, of course. Wild animal attacks just happen!

"Hi, Shippo!"

"What are you doing?"

Silver ears flicked forward. Once again, total lack of interest, just a slight case of curiosity. In no way should it be thought of as jealousy or concern regardless of the claws digging deep into the tree bark or the grinding of teeth and fangs.

Kagome smiled. "I'm playing a game."

"By yourself?"

Game? What kind of sick twisted game was she playing? Making herself depressed and attempting to make half demons mad with jealousy? NOT that HE was jealous.

"Yes. It is a kind of a fortune telling game."

She was blushing. Inuyasha growled. HE was making her blush, whoever HE was. No bones about it, the dog demon would find out. Soon. He just hoped that Kagome wouldn't miss him too much when he had his little run in with Inu… uh… with the totally unplanned and unfortunate wild animal attack.

"Fortune telling? By tearing up flowers?"

She laughed. Usually her laughter made Inuyasha feel good inside, though he'd never tell her that. There is no way he would be able to take being teased about it without getting violent. He wasn't willing to risk everyone's lives. But today hearing her laughter hurt. It was obviously forced. How often does she force laughter so that everyone thinks that everything is okay?

"Sort of, Shippo. What you do is you take a flower like this one." She stupidly picks up another stupid flower that was bound to make her all depressed again over some stupid idiotic jerk who didn't even deserve her in the first place!

Not that he cared.

"You think of the person that you love that you hope loves you in return." She closed her eyes and smiled a sad smile. "Then you pull off one petal and say 'he loves me'. Unless you are thinking of a girl. Then you would say 'SHE loves me'. See?"

Together they pull off a petal and say that the person they were thinking about loved them. Both of them were blushing now. Inuyasha's claws ripped out a few chunks of the branch he was sitting on. It was taking all of his self control to not jump down and start yelling and doing some tearing up of flowers of his own.

"Next," Kagome explained, "You pull off the next petal and say 'he loves me not'. Or 'she', of course." They both recited the line. Actually, they kept repeating the process over and over again until there were only a few petals left.

"What happens when you get to the end?" asked Shippo, who was obviously mentally counting the petals left.

Kagome cleared her throat. "Well, if the last petal is a 'he, or she, loves me' petal, then that person loves you back. If it is a 'he loves me not' petal, then that means that he doesn't love you." She laughed as she plucked the next petal. "Of course, it's just a silly game, it doesn't really mean that they love you or not."

The fox kit studied his flower again, and counted up how many petals were left. Then he threw the unfinished flower over his shoulder, growling at it a little. This, at least, caused the miko to laugh a real laugh.

"Who were you thinking of?" asked Shippo. Inuyasha held his breath. The rotten brat had the gall to look straight up at him and smile innocently and bare his pathetically small teeth at him. Was he going to rat him out? How long had he known that he was there? Hmm… His hunting skills were getting better.

"It's just a silly game," she said as she finished pulling off the last petal. The 'not' petal. She probably didn't even notice that she sighed heavily.

"Is it Inuyasha?"

She paused. Was it a good pause? Was it a bad no I-don't-love-that-no-good-hanyou-I'd-rather-be-in-love-with-a-scrawny-wolf-or-puny-human pause?

"You know he loves someone else, Shippo." She stood up and brushed off her skirt before heading back to camp. "You coming?"

Hey wait... she didn't answer the question!

Shippo glared up into the tree. "Yeah." Then he gave an evil smile. "If he didn't love someone else would he have been the one you were thinking of?" The rotten brat said that as he took off, knowing that it would be next to impossible to hear Kagome's answer. Though it sounded an awful lot like it might have been a 'maybe'.

Inuyasha dropped to the ground. One, two, three, four…. How many flowers did she go through? Ten, eleven, twelve… Did they all say the same thing? Surely she wasn't taking this flower fortune telling seriously. They were just stupid flowers. Was she thinking of him? What if she was? What if she thought that he loved someone else and that's why she never said she loved him?

She did love him.

Inuyasha sat. Hard.

A girl doesn't throw herself in front of an arrow to save a guy she just kind of likes a little bit. Or sit out with him in the cold when villagers made it known that he wasn't welcome because of his demon blood. Or leave the window in her bedroom open for just in case he came by(at least she BETTER not!). Or sometimes hold hands with. Or glomp all over when he gets a teeny little scratch thinking he was going to die any second just because a drop or two of blood gets spilled. Or fight to get back to even when the well closes them off from each other. Or kiss even while he was in his most dangerous form risking being torn to shreds to save his soul. Or… come to think of it, she's been pretty obvious about it.

Well.

What do you know about that.

So. Now what?

How do you tell someone something without telling them because your nosy friends will make your life miserable if you do? What is it with humans, and apparently wolf demons, that make them want everything said out loud anyhow? Inuyasha kicked at the stems laying in a pile. Why couldn't at least ONE of them give her the right answer?

So the dog demon crouched down and picked a few of the flowers that were near where his miko had been sitting and began counting petals. Sure enough, all of the flowers gave the same answer. Stupid lying yellow flowers. Inuyasha stomped on a few of them as he left the field. Okay, okay, a bunch of them. It was strangely satisfying crushing them to a mushy pulp.

Among the yellow petals he found one that was white and tinged with red. He squat down beside it and counted the petals.

It worked!

Quickly he ripped the flower up, roots, dirt, and all. He looked around and spotted several more. He counted the petals on those too. Twice.

"Stupid Kagome. Of course she would choose the wrong flowers."

After yanking several other flowers up he ran back to camp. Along his path he found some purple flowers that also gave the correct answer. He put a few of them in the with red and white ones, just so she would know that it was just those stupid yellow ones that were the liars.

Not that he cared.

Aw heck, who was he trying to kid? Big deal. So he cared. Which anyone would know if they were actually using the RIGHT STUPID FLOWERS!

Kagome was just finished putting the water on to boil and was sitting near her bedroll as Inuyasha walked into camp. She looked surprised when he dumped the load of flowers onto her head.

"Show me your game."

"What?"

He sat directly in front of her and stared her in the eye. "Show me your fortune telling game."

The sad look on her face irritated him. If she hadn't picked the wrong flowers in the first place… Why does she always have to do things the hard way anyhow?

"Game?"

"The 'he loves me' game."

"Oh."

Since it didn't look like she was going to be picking up a flower any time soon, the impatient hanyou picked one up and put it in her hand.

"Play it."

Her head cocked to one side, studying him silently for a moment. Then she gave a little shrug and pulled off the first leaf.

"He loves me."

"Aren't you supposed to be thinking of someone first?" Was she even sticking to her own rules?

She blushed and looked down at the flower. "Um… yeah…"

"Did you?"

"Yeah." She glanced up at him through her lashes, then back down at the flower.

"Keh. Good. Keep going." He nudged her hand. "You were on the 'he loves me' part. The next one is the 'not' one."

She bit her lip, the same way she always does when she's trying not to smile too big. "He loves me not."

"Keep going."

"He loves me."

"What are you guys doing?"

Inuyasha clamped his hand over the kit's mouth. "She's playing a game. Now shut up."

"He loves me not."

Shippo climbed up onto Inuyasha's shoulder to watch. He grinned broadly. There was only one petal left.

"He loves me." Her lips trembled a bit as they curved into a smile. But she wouldn't look directly at Inuyasha. So he shoved another flower into her hand, swapping it out for the empty stem.

"Do another one," he told her. Then he whispered to Shippo. "She was using the wrong flowers."

Shippo nodded wisely. "Oh, that makes sense."

Together they watched as a pink cheeked Kagome pulled the petals off of another flower. A little quicker this time. Then she went through a third and fourth flower at some gentle urging from her two demon companions.

"Try a purple one too. It isn't just those red and white ones. Try a purple one."

And she did.

ooOOooOOooOOooOOooOOooOOoooOOoo

Author's Note: Thanks for proof reading for me Shoomy2003! Never trust spell check!


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